Alone in the Canyon
This article is no longer available on-line, so we have re-printed it here. Special thanks to Tom Price and The Globe & Mail for originally publishing this article.
Alone in the Canyon, by Tom Price
Wednesday, August 20, 2003 - The Globe & Mail, Page R10
SPRINGDALE, UTAH -- Summer mornings in the sandstone canyons of Zion National Park generate a breathtaking palate of colours. But on this particular day, I won't be around to enjoy the show. Using my body as a wedge, I'm about to stem, chimney and smear my way down Keyhole Canyon, a long series of narrow passages, frigid pools and sloping pour-offs.
Part climbing, part scrambling, part swimming, the sport of canyoneering takes me places few have ever seen, leaves me sore in muscles I didn't know I had, and provides an accessible adventure I feel justified in bragging about.
If you're already into canyoneering, you know that the slot canyons of the U.S. Southwest are the high temples of the sport. And these days, with help from a pioneering outfitter, I can take them on by myself.
Jonathan Zambella, founder of Zion Adventure Company, is my "anti-guide." Over just a couple of hours, he gives me the tools and training I need to take on a world-class slot canyon on my own. Of course, he doesn't really have a choice: Guiding still isn't allowed in Zion, one of America's most popular national parks. But at his "ground school," I learn everything I need to go solo -- like how to get into a dry suit and why I need one in the desert in the first place.
My day starts at 7 a.m. just outside the park in the artists' community of Springdale. There, Zambella and his crew teach students how to rig and use the rappelling gear needed to get though Keyhole Canyon. Around noon, once I have demonstrated that I know how to, for example, rig a belay station, I am issued my gear, given a map and sent on my way.
My first stop is the Park Visitor Center, where I pick up a $7 backcountry permit along with up-to-date weather information. Then I drive into the park proper, looking for a parking site marked on the map I received from Zambella.
Now I'm really on my own -- which is a big part of the appeal. No guide tells me to look here or rest there -- the schedule, and hence the adventure, is all up to me. The trip -- it's hard to know whether to call it a hike, climb or swim -- sends me through a Class IV slot canyon, down three rappels of 10 metres, a dozen three-metre scrambles and a swim through a 30-metre-long pool.
Hauling my dry suit, climbing harnesses, helmets and other gear along the road, I feel a little like an astronaut about to depart on some deep-space mission. But I'm not worried about getting lost -- all adventures should come with maps like this one, which describes in pictures and text exactly how to go. It's just the thing to make nervous explorers feel a little more secure.
After scrambling up a broad sandstone bench, I ease down a steep, 50-metre sandy slope to the Gun Sight, the entrance to Keyhole Canyon. This is where I suit up, pulling my dry suit over my clothes, and slipping on my specially made canyoneering boots, climbing harness and backpacks. Off to the side, a dark cleft in the rock, only a few metres wide and radiating cool air, marks the place where the slot canyon begins.
Entering the fissure, I'm immediately wading through waist-deep water and scrambling down logjams blasted into this earthen crevice during flash floods. Looking up through the narrow defile now 20 metres overhead, it's easy to understand how water shaped this entire region. The serpentine walls undulate back and forth in matched sequence, like frozen waves stood on edge in front of a mirror.
After passing through the Middle Keyhole, I enter the Chambers, a series of wide, smooth-walled grottoes, where I put my new rappelling skills to use. Clearly marked anchors and instructions on the guide map give me the confidence to put my training to work.
Occasionally, no matter how good a climber you are, you'll need to cross a large pool -- like the one after the three-metre climb down into the Flask of the Chambers. Now, the dry suit makes sense. Hypothermia, even in July and August, is a very real possibility, since the sandstone walls that radiate fierce heat in the wider canyons hold little warmth in shady slots.
Leaping into the freezing pool, I discover something they didn't mention in class: The dry suits not only keep you toasty, but they're also personal body rafts. Once in the water, I bob like a cork, making sure to push off with enough momentum to reach the other side of the pool. I float effortlessly, slowly twisting around, while peering up through the narrow walls at the thin slant of southwestern light bouncing off the walls, a strip of blue through a background of orange and burnt umber.
After about two hours in the canyon, I reach the Narrows, a series of tight sections ending first in the tilted "swim" section -- you can imagine how it earned that name -- and then the "fins," where horizontal layers of sediment are exposed, inviting you to explore the local geology.
Another long swim brings me to an open space, as the canyon widens and turns to the right. Exhausted, I scramble up onto a broad ledge and walk a few feet, and there, not 50 metres away, is my parked car. I had traversed the entire canyon's length, completely cut off for hours from anyone else in the park. And I had done it all on my own.
"That's the amazing thing about Keyhole," Zambella says later. "You can have this completely private, full-on adventure right in the middle of one of the most crowded national parks, and never see another person, and never be more than a half-mile from your car."
I stand dripping next to my sedan, grinning madly, while sorting out soggy gear on the hot, wet pavement. Cars full of tourists, safely ensconced in air-conditioned comfort, slow down as they pass, faces -- and occasionally cameras -- pressed to the windows.
Like all good heroes, I smile and wave, then return to sorting gear for the next adventure.